AS THE Ashes heat up we’d all like to do something to sway the outcome – and one Sutton Bonington man could do just that.

But Ian Butler, one of the groundsman at Lord’s where the second test was due to get underway yesterday (Thursday), insisted they will not be swayed by favouritism and just be preparing the best pitch possible.

The 41-year-old grew up in Sutton Bonington and played cricket for the village side and near-by Normanton-on-Soar.

He is one of eight groundsman who was marking out the wicket while speaking to the Echo.

“I left school with not very much going on in my life so I took a YTS in landscape gardening,” He said. “I was made redundant from that and enrolled on a groundsman course while working part time at Loughborough University.

“Then in 1990 I got this job and I’ve been at Lord’s ever since.”

In those 18 years Ian has prepared the pitch for four Ashes tests, of which England have lost three and drawn one (in 1997).

In fact Australia are unbeaten against England at the home of cricket since 1934 although Butler insists: “I really couldn’t tell you about England’s record over the years.”

Even before last weekend’s test in Cardiff there was talk of how batsman friendly the pitch at Lord’s would play and which quick bowler would be brought into the side to replace one of the spinners.

Also with Lord’s penchant for producing drawn games, and the ICC looking to stop Test matches being played on overly batsmen friendly surfaces, the pitch is likely to come under intense media scrutiny.

Butler insists media attention won’t change the way they prepare the pitch and there’s no orders from England’s hierarchy as to how it should play.

“I’ve got to be honest I take what they say in the media with a pinch of salt,” he continued. “We don’t really pay that much attention.

“We provide what we think is the best pitch we can. We don’t really get orders from elsewhere about how to prepare the pitch. We just prepare it how we think the best ground and pitch in the world should be prepared.

“That’s what this place (Lord’s) is. It’s the best in the world.”

Butler now only takes part in the odd staff match but said of this weekend’s action, “I’ll be sat there not too far away, keeping an eye on the clouds.”

But what is it like being so involved in the one of the biggest occasions of the sporting year?

“We have a big responsibility,” he admitted. “I don’t want to sound blase though but I’ve been here so long it’s basically a job. But a brilliant one.”